Those of us who seek out the work of local artists tend to think of Robert Cole Caples as one of our own. His subtle images of Nevada landscapes show such intimacy with their subject they can only have been created by a native son, we like to think.

See for yourself three of his mixed media images of tall, nearly barren desert mountains currently on display in the Sierra Nevada, Great Basin Gallery. These seldom exhibited works, part of the permanent collection of the Nevada Museum of Art, capture the very spirit of our environment, with clear, high-country light playing on the jagged peaks.

Jim McCormick wrote in the Nevada Historical Society Quarterly, Volume 33, summer 1990: “In the 1950’s and 1960’s he created elegant, haunting landscapes that portrayed no place in particular, but were precise distillations of the desert, mountains and dramatic atmospheric effects experienced in the desert. Space is at once telescoped and expanded infinitely. The substance of the mountains and the volume of air are sucked out in favor of the essence of mountains and glowing atmospheric effects.”

Certainly, we assure ourselves, this is the work of a man who spent his lifetime in the intermountain west. Then, of course, we must remind ourselves that Caples was actually a New Yorker, a former student of the National Academy of Design and the Art Students League. He was born in 1908, and never saw Nevada until 1924. And his stay here was interrupted by years of further study in New York and California, service in the Navy during World War II, recuperation from a long illness and finally retirement to Connecticut in 1958. And there he stayed, no longer painting, but devoting years to writing and illustrating a children’s book, “The Potter and his Children.” Published in 1971, it never found an audience. He died in 1979. Surely Caples’ best known works are a series of poignant sketches -- portraits of native Indians, begun in the 1930’s when he was employed by the Federal Arts Project -- that were published by the University of Nevada Press in two limited editions starting in 1972. Many of the originals hang in the president’s office at UNR. The portfolios, “People of the Silent Land: a Portfolio of Nevada Indians,” continue to be avidly sought by collectors.

Visiting the gallery of Great Basin scenery is always a pleasure. If you’re not already familiar with Robert Cole Caples, stop by, spend a little time among his lovely mountains and learn why he’s a favorite among our native sons, expatriate division.

The works of Robert Cole Caples are currently on display in the Sierra Nevada, Great Basin Gallery.